


Personal Experience of a Selfish Person

by NCSP



Category: Original Work
Genre: Coronavirus, Disease, F/M, ME - Freeform, POV First Person, Pandemic - Freeform, Personal Favorite, covis19, personal
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-27
Updated: 2020-03-27
Packaged: 2021-03-01 03:40:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,745
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23338540
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NCSP/pseuds/NCSP
Summary: In these dramatic times, I think my voice should be heard as well
Comments: 7
Kudos: 14





	Personal Experience of a Selfish Person

**Author's Note:**

> Dear all, this is something personal, something that I would’ve never wanted to post.

To those complaining that social media only report Covid-19 news nowadays, and that even Tumblr is flooded by such messages, do you want to know why we’re doing that?

Because there are still **fuckheads** out there who call it “ _just a flu_ ”, who say that “ _their personal freedom is more important_ ”.

Guess what? It fucking isn’t.

No.

Not this time.

This has nothing to do with freedom, with strong powers, with democracy and freedom of speech.

Not this fucking time.

This time, you have to listen.

I don’t give a damn if you think that it was China or the US, or even Andorra, to have released the virus despite what the entire scientific community is saying. Even if you think you’re being played, this isn’t the time to say it.

You’ll say it _later_. You’ll protest _later_. You’ll have all the right to complain _later_.

Now you don’t.

There’s no point in doing so. 

Even if the entire scientific community was lying to us, there’d be no point to go against the empiric proof of how to stop the virus.

This virus can be stopped through isolation. Period.

Until we have a vaccine, that’s the only method.

You don’t like it?

Guess what, no one of the people who are in lockdown does.

Not one of them.

We all hate it.

It’s painful.

It’s traumatic.

There’s no “I’m an introvert and thriving lol” bullshit that holds.

I’m an introvert, I need alone time, I am the one who says “no, please, can we reschedule? I need time to recharge from last night” and yet I think I’ve been crying for at least 17 days over 21 of quarantine, getting to the point of dissociating from time to time.

It is bad.

There’s no way of sugar-coating it.

It is bad, and when you’re personally involved you can say it.

I’m an organised person. I make plans. I need plans. I love planning, scheming, daydreaming about the future. And you know what? For the first time in my life my daydreaming + planning based on reality was happy: in front of me I had a few months with a new love – a person I had been waiting for for at least 20 years – before being parted for the summer. Would I have met his family? Would he have met mine? Would we have travelled for the whole summer?

My plans still hadn’t gotten that far. All I cared about were the months between February and July.

We’d have had all the time to discuss that, to cuddle in bed, to get intimate, to get to know each other’s flaws.

We’d have had all the time to sort it out. And we’d have had the time to do so surrounded by our friends, because university isn’t simply learning, it’s creating a second family.

I had never gotten that feeling during my bachelor, but during my master it took me just two months to feel it. I had been waiting for that for three years. Perfect strangers, but some of them were the best friends one could ask for.

A second family, a family of supporting people, who had come to know my – our – situation, who made jokes about the new couple forming since well, when you’re a course of 30 people everyone is curious about the first couple forming.

A second family of people forming a safety net around me, helping me, making me reason and underlining my mistakes in a way that made me agree, rather than grasping on my bitchy self and tell them to fuck off.

A second family that wasn’t only comprised of my course mates, but also of one of my flatmates, a person I’ll never stop thanking destiny for meeting. She’s that kind of person that would’ve made me cross the street to walk on the opposite pavement had I met her under different circumstances. She made me question so many things about me, about what I believed.

She’s one of the most important people in my life, maybe not for the time we’ve spent together but for how my time with her has managed to make me rethink some things that I considered as certainties.

Well _, now imagine all of this gone_.

Imagine all of this disappearing in the round of 20 hours.

Imagine your plans, your hopes, your dreams of spending time with the person you’ve come to love but to whom you don’t have the courage to admit it, disappear in 20 hours.

Imagine planning three months of cuddling and loving touches, being wiped away by the fact that you’ll have to leave _tomorrow_.

Tomorrow you have to go home, otherwise you’ll be left alone.

You don’t know for how long.

You don’t know what’ll happen if you fall sick as well, as so many others have.

So there’s only one solution: you go back home.

You part from the person you’ve come to love but to whom you don’t have the courage to admit it even in silence, with only a kiss on the cheek since you’ve no idea what his sister may say about you, and you don’t know what he wants her to know.

You don’t blame him.

You’d do the same if you were in his shoes.

You’ve no idea when you’ll meet again.

 _If_ you meet again.

He’s a smoker, and this disease hits the lungs.

He lives in a region where the sanitary system is shitty.

You start regretting not bringing him home with you, where the sanitary system is better, but at the same time you live in a region which is the 4th most contaminated region in the country.

You’ve no idea of what’d have been better.

The only thing you can do is worry.

Wait for a message in the morning, and at the same time panicking every time you don’t get an answer for more than three hours.

You’re not worried he has forgotten you, or that he isn’t paying you the right amount of attention.

You’re worried he’s in ER, and that they’ve decided not to put him in ICU even though he needs it and he’s young because his lungs aren’t good enough.

That’s the point we’ve come to.

That’s what’s keeping us awake at night.

That’s what’s keeping us awake.

Days are already long enough without being unable to get asleep, this way it’s only torture. You stay awake, worrying, feeling everything that could go wrong happen around you, and the day gets even longer.

You start getting depressed.

You start lying in bed staring at the wall.

You start dissociating,

_Emptiness is always better than worry._

But you know what?

It is worth it.

I may be suffering.

I may be turning to alcohol as a solution.

I may have coping mechanism that aren’t the most advisable one, but you know what? I’m realising something about myself.

I’ve always considered myself a selfish person.

Me, before anyone else.

Well, not this time.

I’ve realised that there’s something more important than me.

I’ve realised that even I, the one who considered herself as the ruthless bitch who put herself before anyone else, have my limits. And not in a bad sense.

I’ve realised that before my personal happiness, there’s something else.

There’s a community.

A community of people I don’t know, and that at the same time deserves my respect.

A community who needs me to take a step back in order to let them live, little does it matter that they’re all above 70.

When my granny died she was 82, and yet I still cry every time I think about her.

So I don’t care if I’ve never met them.

I don’t care if they’re not my relatives.

I’m a selfish person, I acknowledge that and I’m not ashamed of it, and at the same time I put their safety before my own happiness.

I suffer, I cry, I’ve started picking at my hangnails and more they skin of my face is a disaster since I can’t stop from picking at it, but I don’t care.

I’m a selfish person, with everything to lose from this lockdown, and yet I’ve seen the world only through my window since 21 days ago.

Does it hurt being 1200 km from the person I love? Yes.

Does it hurt waiting for a message from him every time, thinking he’s not answering because he’s in ER? Yes.

Does it hurt to be stuck home, where I can’t talk about my feelings and where all my turmoils are kept private? Yes.

Would I do otherwise? No.

Not ever.

I understand that this time of suffering is something I can’s fight, something I have to endure for the benefit of others.

And I’m a selfish person.

I’m selfish.

I admit it.

I’d only want to go hug my grandparents. I haven’t seen them in two months.

Now I don’t.

I offer them to make them groceries on Amazon. I explain them how to make a phone call from WhatsApp. I don’t want them to leave the house.

I certainly won’t go to them, even though they fit into the category most at risk and that it may be the last time I hug them.

No, this time it’s not about me.

I want them to survive.

So I won’t go to them

A hug from my grandmother may solve everything: my depression, my doubts, my dissociating.

I prefer sleeping three or two hours a night than exposing her to that risk.

So know what can I say? I started in a polemic form, and ended up writing this post in tears.

I really can’t do much on the front of holding tears back. It’s hard, especially at night. Especially when all other people are asleep and can’t tell you they’re fine.

What I can say it that you must stay home.

I don’t care if you think that people who are on lockdown are being overdramatic. In this case you’re just misinformed. We’re not happy to stay home, I’ve told you why from my personal POV which is one of the less dramatic.

You must stay home because it’s the right thing to do.

Because even thought you’re not a subject at risk, others are, and there’s a time to be selfish and a time to be responsible.

Keep going around, ignoring the people who tell you to stay home, and all those deaths will be upon you.


End file.
